Cinema: Old Wave Manhunt

Harper. As a gum-chewing gumshoe named Harper, Paul Newman stirs awake,
forces open his burnt-out baby-blue eyes, and begins to assess the odds
against his peace of mind. His Los Angeles office is a rat's nest where
the private eye sometimes holes up to sleep. The TV sits humming dumbly
through a test pattern that testifies to a restless night. From a
wastebasket Harper retrieves some sodden coffee grounds in a filter,
brews and glumly drinks a stale, disgusting cupful. Moments later, he
roars along the freeway in a rattletrap sports car that has...